Why is it the fashion to remove your low tom, and replace with a ride?

sam132

Member
Hey,

Why is it the fashion to remove your low tom, and replace with a ride? Most live bands I see do this?

Why? Is it simply a case of "following the crowd?"

Sam
 
Better ride placement.

It's hardly new. Go back through the history of the modern drum set and count how many guys placed their ride over the kick. Even more so when they used to provide a cymbal mount on the drum.
 
Given that most kits I see from the early days of the modern drumkit had a single rack tom, isn't it the other way around? So the question should be: Why is it the fashion to add another rack tom and push your ride further away? Many live bands I see do this?

In any case, it's just a matter of taste. I have one rack tom and two floor toms because I want to have three toms, and I prefer the sound and power of large toms for my style of playing and my genre (I don't really want four toms, since my style doesn't require it, so it would only add complexity to my setup and require me to carry more stuff to gigs). Nothing to do with fashion, it's just a matter of what I prefer.

Of course, there are fashions and trends in drumming too, like with anything else. The 80s had extravagant music with extravagant kits; the 90s had minimalist music with small kits and the 2000s had something in between, often with large drums and cymbals but not a huge number of drums and cymbals. On top of that, each musical genre will often have its own fashions (prog rock drummers often use large kits because they need many sound sources for those complex fills and grooves, while jazz drummers need fewer pieces but are often extremely specific when it comes to how those pieces need to sound, etc).
 
Less drums to carry to the gig!
 
I don't know that it is fashion...probably more convience than anything. I guess some people believe that if they set up their kit like their fav drummer they will play like him/her too.
 
Not everyone takes away all their toms. I simply moved mine to the left so that I could get my ride where I wanted it over the right side of the bass drum.
 
I changed from two mounted toms to one in the 80s. I had a car accident on the way to a gig. The fitting that held the mounted toms in place snapped so I had to play the gig with one mounted tom ... I used the 12" and left the 13" in the car.

I found that I didn't have to adjust a whole lot in its absence so I never bothered getting the fitting fixed. As Ninja said, it meant that the ride could be placed in a more convenient position.
 
Given that most kits I see from the early days of the modern drumkit had a single rack tom, isn't it the other way around? So the question should be: Why is it the fashion to add another rack tom and push your ride further away? Many live bands I see do this?.

This.

Look at drum kits from the 20's, 30s, 40's, 50's and early 60s.

Having the ride in the 2nd rack tom position WAS the normal way to do it for decades, and has merely come back.
 
i have 4 rack toms and still manage to get my ride half way over my right bass drum. imo i like having the ride flat and more in front of me then heavily slanted and off to my side more. its just feels nicer and as a bonus i just have more logical room to add shit! :) but going back to what people were saying for gigs.. i used a 2 rack tom kit for gigs and just moved my 2 toms over so the ride is over the bass.. its all about feel. not "jumping on the bandwagon" theres a reason people play with there equipment where they do, and that reason is almost never 'just because blah blah from the band islitmywrists does'
 
Not everyone takes away all their toms. I simply moved mine to the left so that I could get my ride where I wanted it over the right side of the bass drum.

+1 I still have 2up, 1dn. I just have my 2up on cymbals stands, with the right-most tom being towards the left side of the offset bass drum. this allows the ride and toms to be in a slightly more comfortable positions, while still having minimal separation between rack and floor toms.
 
I use 1 rack but my ride cymbal stays where it would be if I had two racks up on the kick. That second rack tom seems like an unnatural reach to me anymore.
 
Not everyone takes away all their toms. I simply moved mine to the left so that I could get my ride where I wanted it over the right side of the bass drum.

+1, the kit feels natural like that, and i love to play my ride just over the kick..
 
You could look at somebody like Jojo Mayer though: he only uses one tom, but his ride cymbal is still sorta' out there because he has a remote hi-hat where his second tom would be. So it's not just getting the ride cymbal in a comfortable spot for him.

And it is kind of a fashion thing. Most drummers (myself included) will go either way (would it be ok to use the term bi-tom'd?). I use to use one, now I use two. At some point I'll go back, and then switch some time after that. The important thing is that the bass drum, snare drum, and hi-hat remain the same, since those are the main money-makers!
 
I use 1 rack but my ride cymbal stays where it would be if I had two racks up on the kick. That second rack tom seems like an unnatural reach to me anymore.

Same here. Two toms up top just strikes me as awkward, both in sound and feel. When I've used a 10" and a 12", the 10" just feels like too small of a tom to have in front of me. I don't like the pitch of a 10", since I like a 16" on the floor. The 12" feels way too far away for my left hand. I could do a 12" and 13" but it just seems pointless, since the pitch is so close.

12" or 13" with a 16" on the floor is all I need...and you can do a lot with it. I just can't bring myself to use a bigger kit!

I also just recently moved my ride further off to the right and at a steeper angle. It made a huge difference in comfort, when moving around the kit.
 
Didn't realize it was a fashion shift...I thought that the 1 up config (single Chinese tom, for effect) came first! Since when did people start using a tom on the floor? What? The 1920s? What do they need with all of those drums that you can't do on just the single Chinese tom?
 
I have taken my set which is three up, one down, to a one up, one down set up and liked it a lot. But then I had two toms collecting dust, and two more sounds left out of the mix. I have my ride about 14 inches to the right of where it would be without the large rack tom, but have gotten use to it and have no problem playing it out there. If I could get what I want for it I would sell it and buy a nice 24, 13, 16 set and save some space.
 
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I have my two top toms to the left to get the ride in what I call the classic position, for want of a better description, Buddy Rich, Ian Paice position etc; then my two floor toms.
It's a very natural/comfortable position for a ride, imo.
 
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